Five years.

Five years after masks, stay-at-home orders, vaccines and daily emergency news conferences that changed the lives of everyone in North Carolina, Dr. Mandy Cohen sat back down on the stage where the coronavirus crisis symbolically started for her in Raleigh.

Cohen recently sat down with Spectrum News 1 anchor Tim Boyum for an exclusive interview recapping her time serving as the North Carolina Department of Human Health Services secretary.

They met where she’d spent nearly every day for two years, at the emergency operations center in Raleigh.

When the pandemic first hit, she remembered how unprepared the federal and state government was at taking on such an enormous task like the coronavirus outbreak.

“One piece of information at a time would come in, and then someone would take that information and then enter it onto a spreadsheet,” Cohen explained, clarifying the year was 2020. “And then we would add that all up, and that’s how we were first putting all of our data together. That’s bananas.”

She first knew how big of a deal it would be after seeing a video of a hospital being put up in China in less than 10 days.

When the coronavirus started affecting the state, Cohen said she had hundreds of staff members pulling data from fax machines before a more efficient process could be added.

And don’t even get her started on the news conferences.

“I don’t know how we did that many press conferences…in a row,” she said. “If I knew what that would be, I would’ve melted into the floor.”

She said every day felt like a week, but having a leader like Gov. Roy Cooper by her side made things easier.

Soon enough, Cohen was able to get away from those fax machines and use staff for more important tasks. She also integrated graphs and other data sets to better explain to the public what trends the state was seeing, why they were making the decisions they were and their goals.

Don’t forget her three W’s — wear, wait and wash.

As COVID-19 testing continued and the civil restrictions and early limited vaccine availability continued to grow on residents, some North Carolinians were behind Cooper and his team, while others protested and even pushed back with threats. Some took to the streets, protesting with the hashtag “ReopenNC” following the governor’s stay-at-home order and mask mandates.

“We were all scared. I was worried about my kids in New York. They were five and eight at the time, my girls. December 2020 I had some protesters at my home, but I felt well looked after by Capitol Police,” she said.

Cohen said her neighbors took things a step further the next night by laying out candles in the shape of a heart to show that they were with her. 

Though uncertain of what lies ahead, Cohen said there will be plenty of family time ahead for her. And from a career standpoint, she said she plans to "lead in service of healthy communities."

For now, however, she said it’s good to be back home in Raleigh.